Typically file handles are as follows:

open (FILEHANDLE,file);
the file is usually in the format as follows:

'< filename'   Open file for input 
'+< filename'  Open file for input and output append
'+> filename'  Open file for input and output and truncate the data 
'filename'     Open file for input 
'>filename'    Open file for output, truncate data 
'>>filename'   Open file for output, append to file
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You are using open (INTER, ">>fred");
This is strictly for writing, append to file. Because I do not see where you closed the file, I can not assume that you will not try to write to it later, so I would change it to: open (INTER, "+<fred");


Cameron